android

Google wants developers to focus on quality of apps on tablets. There are mainly two types of issues. Most of the Apps developers do a quick and dirty job by expecting to run the Apps devloped for mobile handset to be run on Tablets as well. Also developers seldom pay attention to the different screen sizes and resolutions by different Android tablets.

This checklist is essentially to trap all the issues due to screeen sizes as well as trying to use unsupported features on tablet devices (e.g. wireless network or telephony)

Apple got a victory today in a patent court over HTC. Its about tapping a phone number in an email or any content (e.g. web page may have a contact number of a vendor) to call or add in contact number. From HTC it is a small UI fix. However, removing such feature would pose an usability issue to HTC and indirectly to Android.

It seems that Apple has many such patents which when pressed against Android can create a competitive barrier.

This year has been interesting from patents point of view. Apple and Microsoft ganged up to by Nortells patent portfolio at billions. Then, the corneded Google bought Motorolla mobility especially for the patents. On other wise, there is a patent war going between Samsung and Apple of Samsung Galaxy.

Google announced today that it is buying Motorola Mobility at 12.5 billion with 60% premium. At prima facie, this move may seem like Google’s entry into mobile hardware devices to challenge Apple. However, Google never positioned itself in hardware or devices moreover. So, if Google is serious about entering into making mobiles, it would be in a direct competition with vendors like Samsung, LG, HTC who are manufacturing mobile devices on Google’s Android platform. This would negatively impact the partnership. As per Google, since Android is open-source, this move by Google should not cause any worry to the mobile devices manufacturers. Of course, this comment would not reduce the worried of the devices manufacturers. so, would Google really enter into the mobile device manufacturing? What is the rational for paying such a huge amount for buying ailing Motorola Mobility? Is there any other reason behind this? May be there can be another motive of this buy. For that, we need to see what was happening in last few weeks.

Recently Apple and Microsoft bought 6000 patents portfolio of Novell. Google was bidding for the same but lost the bid. A consortium led by Apple and Microsoft paid 4.5 billion for the patent portfolio. Immediately Google complained that Apple and Microsoft are ganging up to choke Google’s Android platform.

On this background, it is important to note that recent buy would give Google an access to Motorola Mobility’s 17,000 patetns and 7500 patent applications . May be it is the patent war that compelled Google to throw $12.5 b for Motoroloa Mobility. Or is it Google going to be serious to take on Apple in its mobile devices turf?